H.O.R.M.E.S.I.S.
H.O.R.M.E.S.I.S., also known as the HO'rmetic '''R'egenerating 'M'asochist that 'E'volves and 'S'trengthens from 'I'ncreasing 'S'tressors, is a Quest Boss that appears in BTD7: Planet of the Apes. It is my first evaluation boss, which is a boss that modifies its behavior based off how much damage it receives during a certain phase. It is FPS-Mode exclusive. History The HORMESIS was designed by the EMPEROR to be able to grow stronger as it takes more damage, as a countermeasure against the powerful DPS units of the Monkey Empire (e.g. the Ray of Doom). Once the final product was perfected, 6 HORMESIS blimps were constructed and assigned to Luna Bloonus with one objective: Protect the Bloonian Shadow Generator (a.k.a. the Engine of Darkness), whatever it takes. Behavior Evaluation Phase After being hit, the HORMESIS will taunt: "Intruders! Who dares to encroach upon the chasm of the Engine of Darkness?" Then, he will flash blue and fire predictively-targeted spreads of 5 plasma bullets at the player, with each bullet inflicting 600-700 damage. These bullets can PIERCE through their targets so Squadmates and Towers that you place cannot block them from hitting you. This phase will last for 7 seconds, and during this phase the HORMESIS will take any damage inflicted on it without getting killed by said damage. Relative damage (damage based off percentages of the target's max HP or RBE) is completely ineffective during this phase. The more damage it receives during this phase, the stronger will it be in its subsequent phases. To force evaluation to stop, inflict 2,000,000 damage. During the Evaluation Phase, the HORMESIS has 5 Defense. At Impoppable Mode, killing a HORMESIS has a 20% chance of raising the next HORMESIS' Evaluation Level by 1. These are the levels of evaluation in which behavior is modified as damage evaluated is increased. Level 1 Damage Range: 3-90,400 Taunt: "Just a few savages? I expected your numbers to be more." Spawns 5 HORMESIS Drones. Level 2 Damage Range: 90,401-366,354 Taunt: "A moderately-sized pack of primitive beings. I anticipated a larger party, but this will do. Spawns 12 HORMESIS Drones and 1 HORMESIS Mega-Drone. Level 3 Damage Range: 366,355-827,648 Taunt: "Now THIS is a crowd. A fun little slaughterhouse." Spawns 17 HORMESIS Drones and 4 HORMESIS Mega-Drones. Level 4 Damage Range: 827,649+ "AHA, AN UNCIVILIZED LEGION TO MASSACRE!! HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!" Spawns 22 HORMESIS Drones and 9 HORMESIS Mega-Drones. Attack Phases After the Evaluation phase is complete, the HORMESIS will switch to its Attack Phases. The amount and lethality of HORMESIS' attack phases depends on the amount of damage it received during the Evaluation Phase. Phase 1 (150,000 HP) During Phase 1: HORMESIS will continue to fire his predictively-targeted 5-spread plasma shots as basic attacks, and will also execute the following abilities: * '''Molecular Reconstruction - HORMESIS regenerates X% HP per second for 6 seconds. % HP regenerated per second varies by Evaluation Level: ** Level 1: 6% ** Level 2: 7% ** Level 3: 8% ** Level 4: 9% ** Please note that the percentage values are relative to the max HP of the boss that corresponds with its buff level. For example, Level 1 Molecular Reconstruction regenerates 6% of 400,000 HP whereas Level 4 Molecular Reconstruction regenerates 9% of 978,000 HP. * Naive Interventionism - '''The HORMESIS ''downgrades'' the nearest 3 Squadmates by 1-4 tiers (debuff tier increases as Evaluation level is increased) for 20 seconds. The HORMESIS will also target the nearest 4 Squadmates that have support abilities (e.g. healing other people, boosting their stats, etc.) and manipulate them into wasting their support abilities on entities that need it the least, e.g. forcing NPCs with healing capabilities to waste their regeneration abilities on full-health or near-full-health allies while leaving the ones that are severely-wounded to die. * '''Plasma Cyclone - The HORMESIS fires plasma rays like an Arras.io Hurricane. Each ray inflicts 450-575 Armor-Piercing Damage (damage values are dictated by RNG and not Evaluation level) and applies BURNING DoT which lasts for 6 seconds. Phase 2 (250,000 HP) * The Bloon That Gains from Disorder, At Others' Expense - The HORMESIS deliberately gives itself molecular asymmetry, disorganizing itself for 6 seconds. During this period, the HORMESIS cannot directly attack you but attacks inflicted upon it will have a 75% chance to MISS. After this 6-second time period, the HORMESIS's molecules split into groups of two, with each group forming a disorganized and distorted clone of the HORMESIS. Each clone unleashes a devastating swirl of huge plasma balls that inflict 1,100-1,300 Armor-Piercing Damage. These plasma balls also PIERCE through their targets. The distorted replicants exhibit this behavior for 11 seconds before morphing back into the single HORMESIS blimp, and the reorganized HORMESIS will inflict 60% more damage for 15 seconds. * Nonlinear Regression - The HORMESIS' minions self-replicate themselves by 2 for 5 seconds. Their replicants also split into more replicants and so on for that period of time, which results in the exponential increase in minion population. Organisms are populations and populations are organisms. Phase 3 (Evaluation Levels 3-4 only) (200,000 HP) * Antifragile Bloons Manifesto (And Collective Fragility) '''- The HORMESIS will spawn 20-25 Fortified Hormetic Ceramic Bloons around himself, each of them armed with Bloonian Dark Rifles. * '''Monkey Megafragility - For 20 seconds, every attack from HORMESIS or his minions that hits the player character will cause their damage resistances to decrease per hit via exponential decay, asymptotically towards 0. The player character will not have his/her pre-debuff damage resistance restored until after all HORMESISes are killed. Phase 4 (Evaluation Level 4 only) (378,000 HP) Taunt: "Your delivered dose of pain was... scrumptious. Now, be rewarded with a swift and terrible demise." * Black Swan Event - HORMESIS will give the player character, his/her companion, Squadmates, and other allied NPCs +30% damage and +20% damage resistance for the duration of the fight against the HORMESIS that used this ability, at the cost of reducing the Evaluation thresholds of the other bosses by 20% (meaning that it will take less damage to trigger their evaluation responses), and giving the other bosses 30% faster ability cooldowns. This ability is hidden - the player will not be notified by the game when activated - because Black Swan events have little to no warning before they happen. With this ability also comes a devastating hidden aftereffect for Impoppable Difficulty: All bosses fought after the HORMESIS fights will have their attack damage increased by 20% per every 25 seconds that it takes for the player to kill off all the other HORMESISes, capping at a maximum of a 80% damage increase. * Simian Pseudoconvexity - The player character and his/her allied NPCs will have their maximum health values increase as they take damage for 20 seconds, followed by a 2-second pause. Then, the entities in question will have their maximum health values rapidly deplete to 8% of the original maximum health without immediately killing them. These entities will thereby be stuck with this low health pool even after the HORMESIS within the immediate vicinity dies, and will only wear off once all HORMESISes are killed. This ability cannot stack. * The Probabilistic Trickster - (WIP) Strategy There are 6 of these bosses spread out equally around the Engine of Darkness. Each of them exist in catatonia until attacked, and while they are alive the Engine will be protected by an indestructible and impenetrable barrier. Therefore, you cannot complete the mission to destroy the Engine without having killed all of the HORMESISes first. The best way to defeat them is to take them down one-by-one. DO NOT attack more than one of them per fight, because when a HORMESIS is activated, hitting another inactivated HORMESIS will trigger a chain reaction that will wake up the rest of them, and during their Evaluation Phases they will also receive all the damage inflicted to the first HORMESIS activated. This will result in all 6 HORMESISes attacking you at once and buffed by the damage inflicted on the first one attacked. In other words, all hell will break loose. Allied NPCs will not attack any of the HORMESISes until they are activated. However, once activated the NPCs in question will not stop attacking them, and the amount of damage inflicted by them will count into the evaluation response of the boss. One must be careful not to add too much damage into the fray, unless they desire to fight HORMESIS in its full power for a challenge. Trivia * The HORMESIS is currently the only boss in the game in which the outcome of how it is defeated will permanently affect the difficulty of all subsequent enemies in the game for the rest of the story. * The HORMESIS contains multiple references to several books written by Nassim Nicholas Taleb, including Antifragility: Things that Gain from Disorder ''and ''The Black Swan: The Impact of the Highly Improbable. In this case, HORMESIS manifests these references to come across as an entity that evolves from stressors at the expense of the collective that is the non-Bloonian population of the universe, enforced this way from the top-down by the Bloon Regime's leaders. ** This contrasts with the Monkey Empire's use of antifragility, achieving it at the expense of individuals who willingly sacrifice themselves for the prosperity of the greater good via a largely bottom-up system. Category:BTD7: Planet of the Apes Category:Bosses Category:Immune Bosses Category:Bloons Category:M.O.A.B. Class Bloons Category:Immune Bloons Category:Attacking Bloons